


stick talk

by bluelines



Category: Hockey RPF, Women's Hockey RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/F, NHL RPF, Women in the NHL
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-26
Updated: 2018-03-07
Packaged: 2019-03-24 10:40:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 18,399
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13809480
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bluelines/pseuds/bluelines
Summary: At the beginning of the 2016-2017 season, the NHL implements a new program because Hockey Is For Everyone--each NHL team must have at least one pro female player on their NHL or AHL roster. With a chip on their shoulders and something to prove, it's easy to let international rivalries spill over.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Trust me, I know how unrealistic this is. I am not an advocate for women in the NHL in real life, but the idea was too good to pass up. Please support the CWHL and NWHL as well as women's college hockey and the Minnesota Whitecaps so that these women actually do have somewhere to play! But also, enjoy for a few minutes a fantasy world where women in the NHL isn't a pipe dream or a very very bad idea.

It starts with a hit.

It’s early, still November, the second month of the first season with women full-time in the NHL, and the jitters have only just started to fade. Meghan’s not expecting to get substantial minutes, really, and neither is Kacey, but they’re in for a surprise.

Kacey’s starting.

“Oh,” Kacey says, under her breath, eyes on the whiteboard. Meghan elbows her, and Carlo turns around for a high five. It’s a little unorthodox--starting a rookie and a woman--but Meghan loves it, and she can tell from how pink in the face Kacey is that she loves it, too. She almost misses Brandon’s hand entirely.

“Holy shit,” Meghan says, following Kacey to their separate changing area, “Kace, holy shit.”

“Stop,” Kacey says, “I’m gonna puke on you.”

“You’re _starting_ ,” Meghan says, “at TD Garden, as a Bruin. What the fuck, oh my god. Kacey, this is real. We’re really doing this.”

“You have said some variation of that every single time we’ve played here,” Kacey points out, but she’s shaking, and Meghan is too. 

Tonight feels more real, somehow. Bruce starting Kacey means something, even if Meghan’s not sure what. She doesn’t want to commit to hoping this means that he’s going to play them more regularly, that she and Kacey can both earn minutes just like anyone else. So many teams with women on them use them as figureheads--give them less than ten minutes a game, just to say they have, just to market them--and Meghan had never really let herself hope for much more than that.

But this is different. Meghan is sitting on the edge of the bench when the puck drops. She resisted the urge to look for Kacey’s family or her own in the seats, but she knows that they’re there. Kacey’s the only woman on the ice; Toronto only has one, and Meghan knows enough about them from tape to know that the Leafs will only roll her out when Meghan’s on the ice.

She’s sort of wrong about that. Two minutes into Kacey’s shift--near the end, for sure--Apps’ line hits the ice, and Meghan doesn’t think much of it. She’s watching the game, listening to Pasta in her right ear trying to tell her something. Someone passes the puck back to Kacey, and she keeps it for a few seconds, long enough for Brandon to get more open while she crosses into the neutral zone. A full second or two after she makes the pass, Apps is boarding Kacey into the Toronto bench, and Meghan is on her feet.

Kacey makes it back to the bench, but she doesn’t look great. The crowd has already forgotten her, and Apps is still on the ice. Meghan barely gets a chance to check on Kacey, her glove on the top of Kacey’s bucket, before she’s being tapped to roll out.

She knows what her job is. She’s usually very serious about doing her job and doing it well. This time she has a little bit extra incentive to get to the dirty places, to dig the puck out and find Matt or Tim, because Apps is there waiting for her. She’s impressively big, but less so on ice with NHL players than during the Olympics. Meghan’s not afraid of her. She keeps seeing Kacey’s face, the way she had winced when she sat down, hand on her side.

If Meghan pushes back hard against Apps on her back, harder than is technically necessary, she doesn’t regret it.

-

Gillian isn’t sure how it happens, but there’s a burst of pain and the puck battle is lost and her line is called off the ice. She doesn’t realize for a few seconds that she’s the reason their shift is over, until the trainer is crouching in front of her, telling her to take her helmet off.

Dazed, she takes off one glove and reaches up to her nose. It comes back bloody. Next to her, Nazem looks more concerned than usual, his eyebrows pulled together when he glances her way.

“Who the fuck was that?” Gillian hisses. She’s expecting one of the defensemen--maybe McQuaid throwing an elbow up for a cheap shot that she’s seen before--but he doesn’t answer her. Mitch is the one who does, leaning over from Nazem’s other side.

“Duggan,” he says, and the trainer ignores all of them, handing Gillian a tampon and closing her fingers around it. Gillian is not looking forward to putting it in her nose, or the camera shots she know there will be of her doing it.

“Fucking punk,” Gillian says, and she’s surprised to find she hardly means it. Nobody’s given her much of any kind of difficulty so far, and she almost likes the idea of it, the challenge of someone finally pushing back. She stuffs the tampon in her nose. Immediately, she’s on the JumboTron at TD Garden, and a whole crowd of Bruins fans are laughing at her. 

Duggan is on the bench then, Marchand clapping her on the helmet, and Gillian’s blood pressure spikes. She doesn’t see Bellamy, and for the first time she wonders whether it’s related. 

Well, it must be. 

“She wants a fight,” Mitch says, when Nazem’s line rolls and he can sit next to Gillian, “you should do it, you could totally lay her out in front of this home crowd, Appsy.”

“No,” Gillian says. She deserved the bloody nose. Fair is fair. 

Except it doesn’t stop. The next time they’re on the ice Duggan won’t leave her alone. If she were two inches shorter and fifty pounds lighter, Duggan’s cross check would have sent her sprawling. As it is, she’s too tall and too big to do more than sway and slide a few feet back, so the whistle doesn’t even go. It doesn’t often for women. 

That goes on for the rest of their shifts, and every time Duggan hits her Gillian gets more and more annoyed. 

“I got it the first time,” she hisses, towards the end of the second period.

“I don’t think you did,” Duggan says, popping her mouth guard when the whistle blows, skating just a little too close, “don’t fuck with her.”

“She’s a big girl,” Gillian says, “but still needs you to defend her honor, eh?”

“Fuck off,” Meghan says. “Fucking goon.”

They’re smiling the whole time. 

-

“I hate her,” Meghan announces between periods. 

“I’m fine,” Kacey says, but she’s not dressed. She’s got an ice pack saran wrapped to her ribs. 

“I wish she’d nut up and fight me,” Meghan says. She realizes it as she says it: that’s what she wants. She wants Gillian Apps to fight her. Properly, one on one, gloves dropped, the way they never can in international play.

“She would kick your ass,” Kacey says, leaning her head back into her locker and closing her eyes. 

“Fuck you,” Meghan laughs. 

“I dunno,” Brandon says, from Kacey’s other side, “my money’s on Duggs. I bet she pulls hair.”

“I don’t even need to pull her hair,” Meghan says. 

“She’s tall,” Brad says, “sweep her legs.”

“That’s not a fight,” Meghan insists, “I wanna punch her right in her smug Canadian mug. No offense.”

Brad laughs. Chara quiets everyone, and Meghan listens to the talk, but she’s still thinking. Wondering what it would take to get Apps to fight her. 

She knows she doesn’t have much of a chance left. The next time she’s on the ice, they line up opposite each other, and Meghan leans in as close as she reasonably can. 

“Starting to look a little desperate,” Gillian says. 

“You’re starting to look like a big fucking baby,” Meghan chirps right back. Gillian ignores her. Meghan’s blood boils. Gillian’s right. She’s starting to look desperate, and she fucking hates that, especially in front of a home crowd. 

“Fighting me to make your girlfriend want you would only work if you win,” Gillian says. Meghan, at the mention of Kacey—who she almost snaps is not her girlfriend—can feel the itch in her palms. The noise of the crowd is ratcheting up. The ref skates to center ice with the puck. 

“You’ll never fight me,” Meghan says, “you’ve got a pedigree.”

Apps stiffens. The puck drops before she can say anything else. Meghan thinks for sure that was enough, and she’s not completely wrong, because the puck goes out of place and Meghan stays in Gillian’s face long enough that Gillian shoves her off. They’re not far from the slot. Meghan can see Tuukka watching her over Gillian’s shoulder. 

“Fucking do it,” Meghan says, shoving Gillian again. The refs are watching them, too. The crowd is quieter than Meghan remembers. Gillian is close enough to her that she has to look down into Meghan’s face. That’s all she does. She fixes Meghan with an icy stare, waits a few seconds, and then turns to skate away from her. 

Meghan does not take well to being ignored on a good day. It’s not a good day. They’re scoreless into the third, Kacey is hurt, and Gillian is making her look like a desperate, trigger happy idiot in front of a sold out crowd at TD Garden. 

So she takes off one of her gloves and throws it squarely at the center of Gillian’s number like a bulls-eye. 

The crowd goes silent. Well, almost silent. Gillian turns around, and Meghan’s heart surges into her throat, because it’s happening, she can tell from the look on Gillian’s face. It’s the look that says Meghan is about to get punched, and she loves it. 

Gillian pulls her in by the front of her jersey. Meghan blocks the first punch with her forearm and it feels like if she did it again it would break. She swings and, to her absolute shock, manages to glance across Gillian’s jaw. She stands back up straight to keep Gillian from yanking her down, the roar of the crowd quiet beneath the roar of her own blood in her ears. Gillian swings again when Meghan gets her hand fisted in the laces at the front of Gillian’s jersey, and she makes significant contact. Meghan can feel that her lip is split, can taste her blood in her mouth, and in a split second she’s done the stupidest thing imaginable and leaned over to try and rugby tackle Apps to the ice. 

Even with a skating head start she wouldn’t have made it. Apps topples her easily, so easily she doesn’t even have to go down, herself. The ice feels good on Meghan’s lip. When she comes up with the help of a ref’s hands around her arm, she’s laughing. 

-

In the ensuing four-on-four, Marchand pots one that wins the game. Nobody seems especially upset at Gillian, considering she was harassed into a fight that she won in an away rink, but she’s still antsy and nervous thinking about the hot takes she’s going to have to hear. 

The whole point of playing in the NHL was to prove they’re no different. Shouldn’t fighting be a part of that?

And yet. 

“That was fucking badass,” Mitch says. Auston laughs at him. Gillian puts her headphones in. 

“Hey,” Mitch says, leaving over the back of Gillian’s seat, “Appsy. Hey. What are you listening to?”

“It’s probably an audiobook,” Auston says. 

“Green Day,” Gillian says, hoping they’ll shut up. 

“Dude,” Mitch says, turning back to Auston, “mom is cool.”

“Don’t call me that,” Gillian says for the thousandth time. 

She’s not listening to Green Day. She scrolls through Twitter to see that the fight is everywhere, as she expected. She avoids anything but the team and NHL Twitters, but on the Bruins’ she sees that Meghan got a postgame interview. She’s in a long-sleeved Bruins shirt and a flat brimmed hat, her wet hair braided to the side. Her lip is pretty busted, but she still looks good. Or at least, Gillian thinks, she’s wearing mascara and eyeshadow. 

“So tell us about the fight,” one of the mics says. Everyone else laughs. Meghan smiles a little, and Gillian is furious about the dimple she notices.

“Can’t win them all,” Meghan says, reaching up to touch her lip. “But seriously, I mean—it’s a rivalry. We may not be the typical fourth line grinders you’d expect to hash it out, but a rivalry is a rivalry. We’ve played each other for years internationally too and I wanted to give the crowd—and the guys—some energy. And it worked, didn’t it? I mean, what’s a split lip in the face of three points at home?”

-

“You’re an idiot,” Kacey says. It’s not the first time tonight and it won’t be the last. Meghan, next to her on the bus, closes her eyes. Her entire face is throbbing from her lip. 

“She thought I was defending your honor,” Meghan says. 

“Were you not?” Kacey asks, and Meghan has to admit that it’s a good point. It’s also not what’s bothering her. 

“She thought we were a couple,” she continues. 

“You tell me all the time that a chirp is a chirp,” Kacey says. “Remember that time that fuzzy douchebag on the Sharks asked Hilary if she was hungry and she thought she was fat for a week? Who cares what she said?”

Meghan’s not sure how to answer. She’s not sure why she _does_ care what Apps said about her, or what she assumes about Kacey, but she does. It bothers her. It’s gotten under her skin.

“I need a drink,” she mutters.

“I need a 25 minute shower, a box of Cheez-its, and my bed,” Kacey counters. 

Meghan doesn’t say anything, just shifts in her seat. She can’t get over the way Apps had swung at her. She wonders if things have always been like that, if Apps has been wanting to sock her in the jaw through years of international competition, and then she reminds herself that it’s almost definitely not that serious. It was just a fight. None of her teammates overthink it when they get their asses handed to them in front of a full arena.

“You need to get laid,” Kacey says, knocking her knee against Meghan’s, “that’s what you need. If I didn’t have two broken ribs I’d offer to--”

“Shut up,” Meghan laughs, “before one of the rookies hears you and thinks you’re serious.”

Kacey’s not wrong, though, and it sticks in Meghan’s head. She’s antsy, and she knows that getting her hands on another woman will help, because it almost always does, when she’s like this. Once she’s home she changes clothes, slips into a pair of leggings and a denim button-down, and she’s back on the street in ten minutes. On the way there she plays through it in her mind. The kind of woman she’ll want to talk to, the mixed drink she’s going to order.

What she’s not expecting, when she walks in the door of the gay bar, is Gillian Apps.

For one thing, it just doesn’t seem like her scene. It’s not a lesbian bar; there are none in Boston. It’s the kind of gay bar that caters to sports, though, which attracts a very specific crowd, and Apps looks out of place, too big and too quiet, sort of hunched in on herself at one end of the bar with a tallboy in her hand.

Meghan doesn’t hesitate. The seat next to Apps is open and Meghan slides into it. Apps notices her, but Meghan doesn’t make eye contact until she’s ordered her drink, and when she does the look she’s getting is certainly interesting. She doesn’t look pleased. She looks surprised, annoyed, maybe a little disgusted. She doesn’t look drunk enough.

“Hey,” Meghan says to the bartender, “let’s get another one of whatever she’s drinking, too.”

-

“I can get my own drinks,” Gillian mumbles. Meghan looks clean and refreshed, minus her lip. Gillian has a bandage across her nose and her hand hurts from where she hit Meghan. Meghan, who’s buying her a drink at a gay bar in Boston. Gillian doesn’t like any of this, much less the beer she’s drinking. 

“Figured I owed you one,” Meghan says. Gillian’s not sure when ‘Duggan’ turned to ‘Meghan’ in her head.

“For losing a fight?” Gillian asks, and Meghan’s eyebrows jump.

“For winning the game,” Meghan says, “since, you know, that’s what goes in the standings.”

Gillian finishes her beer. Meghan’s smiling at her, and Gillian is infuriated again by the dimple, by the fact that she can tell Meghan has one on both sides. Meghan is the kind of woman who knows exactly how hot she is, especially here. Gillian can’t understand why Meghan would be sitting here buying _her_ drinks when she could pull any of the hotter women milling around. It feels a little like pity, which makes Gillian want to punch her again. Especially when she remembers Meghan’s dig at her pedigree.

“It’s a rebuilding year,” Gillian says. Meghan’s not really listening to her. She can tell.

“Seriously,” Meghan says, “no hard feelings, right? I mean, it’s November, it’s one game. Plus--I mean, we’re famous now.”

“Yes,” Gillian says, “because what I wanted was to be all over the news for being one of the first women in the NHL to throw a punch.”

“That’s not why you’re famous,” Meghan says, “come on, you know that. You’re--”

“An Apps,” Gillian snaps, “yeah, you said that already.”

That might have been a little bit much. The beer Meghan ordered her comes, and Gillian feels bad opening it, so she doesn’t, not right away. Meghan nurses her drink, and Gillian wishes she would just leave her there, get down to what she came to the bar to do.

“I didn’t mean that,” Meghan says, eventually. Gillian is startled by the change in her tone, enough to make eye contact. Meghan’s expression is open and sincere, and Gillian can’t find it in her to be angry about it. 

“I was going to say that people know you because you’re good,” Meghan says, “they know your name because you’re a Leaf.”

If it’s supposed to flatter her, it works. Gillian can feel her face getting hot and can only hope that she’s not blushing, or that it’s dark enough in the bar that Meghan can’t see it if she is. Regardless, Gillian knows it’s not true. Her shot count is low because she’s urged not to shoot. She hasn’t scored a goal yet in the NHL. She might not ever. She’s not in the NHL the way her father was, or the way her grandfather was. Some days she wonders if she should have bothered at all.

But it’s nice of Meghan to say.

“Sorry about your mouth,” Gillian says, once she’s popped open the beer and had a sip. Meghan is smiling at her again, and Gillian feels distinctly hotter under the collar than she wants to. It only irritates her a little bit that Meghan is having this conversation instead of talking up one of the hot women in the bar with their eyes on her. There are more than one of them, but Meghan hasn’t noticed them, or at least hasn’t indicated that she has.

“I deserved it,” Meghan says, “I wanted it,” and if Gillian didn’t know better she’d think that Meghan was _flirting_ with her.

“Should have just jerseyed you,” Gillian murmurs.

“That would have been embarrassing,” Meghan admits, and Gillian kind of likes her for her humility. She goes back to her beer for a bit, and Meghan goes back to her drink, and somehow, the way it often does between two women at a gay bar, things feel normal. Gillian knows something about Meghan now, and Meghan knows something about her. It’s something they have in common other than hockey--women--and it makes it easier for Gillian to tolerate Meghan sitting right there next to her. 

That’s until their fight comes on one of the TVs. Gillian watches it like a train wreck, unable to look away, feeling sicker every second. She looks huge and dangerous next to Meghan, and she winces when she makes contact with Meghan’s mouth on television. She’s so busy watching it happen, subject to Meghan’s rapt attention, that she misses it until the last second. Half the bar has recognized them.

“Shit,” Gillian mumbles. Meghan has noticed it, too. She glances around and clears her throat.

“We should get out of here,” she says. 

“Didn’t you start that fight half to get laid?” Gillian tries to joke, weakly. If there was any doubt Meghan could take her pick of the place, there’s none now. 

“We should get out of here,” Meghan says again, more firmly, and Gillian can’t think of a good reason to argue. She’s wanted to leave since she got there. The momentary thought that it might be nice to go home with someone and forget for a while had faded by the time her drink got to her mouth. She follows Meghan out among murmurs and realizes the inferences the clientele must be making. There are worse rumors, she guesses, and most of the single women playing in the NHL are considered to be lesbians whether they are or not. At least they’d have that much right. 

She doesn’t realize what Meghan meant by ‘we’ until she glances at her phone and says, “Great. Uber’s around the corner.” It’s her first clue. 

Gillian wonders if it would be rude to leave now, knowing, as she does, that her hotel is on the green train line. She wonders when she decided to give a fuck about being rude to Meghan Duggan. And then the Uber arrives. Meghan raises her eyebrows and nudges Gillian’s shoulder with her own, more roughly than she needs to. Gillian panics for a moment, wondering if Meghan has ordered her an uber to make up for instigating the fight, but when she opens the door Meghan slides in behind her, _very_ close behind her, and Gillian finally puts the pieces together. 

“My place is on the green line,” Meghan says, at what must be a very interesting expression on Gillian’s face, “if you want to go.” 

“Your place,” Gillian echoes. Meghan’s lip doesn’t look so bad in the streetlights. Sitting this close in the back of a sedan adds ten seconds to Gillian’s response time. 

“Figured you have a roommate,” Meghan says, “or at least a room next to some rooks.”

“Both,” Gillian admits. Any efforts to split her off from the rest of the team had gone badly outside the locker room. Mo is low maintenance enough as a roommate, even if he seems unclear on how to interact with women generally—with or without a letter—but she’s fairly sure he would be less than accepting about whatever this situation is. The fact is, this sort of fraternization doesn’t happen on the men’s side of the game. You might share a drink with some buddies you’ve played with in juniors or internationally or earlier in your career, but going home with someone isn’t something any of Gillian’s teammates would understand. She’s not sure _she_ understands, but Meghan’s hot, and it’s not going to stop her. 

Plus, Mitch and Auston are next door, and Gillian realizes that she expects Meghan to be as loud in bed as she is everywhere else. 

Meghan watches Gillian’s face intently. Gillian feels studied. Her nose still hurts. 

“Up to you,” Meghan says, and she has a peculiar way of making it sound both sincere and a little bit chirpy. 

-

Gillian does come home with her. 

Meghan is a little bit surprised, and a little impressed with herself. It hadn’t been her original plan, but it makes too much sense not to have tried. Gillian is hot. Meghan had not remembered that from years of international play, but it’s true—Gillian is tall and solid and her hands don’t fit in her pockets, and she has a natural brood to her that’s only better with the broken nose. Meghan wants to kiss her, badly, more badly than she’s wanted to kiss anyone in a while, probably half because she knows she shouldn’t. 

She’s already broken a lot of rules tonight. 

“You don’t have roommates?” Gillian asks, following Meghan up the stairs to the third floor of her building. Meghan shrugs.

“Don’t need to,” she says, “benefit of NHL money, I guess. Kacey’s the only person I’d want to live with and she’s been living with her girlfriend for a year, so.”

She makes a point of saying it, remembering Gillian’s assumption about them earlier, but resists the urge to twist over her shoulder and look at Gillian’s expression. 

“Why,” Meghan asks, fitting her key into the door, “you still have roommates?”

“No,” Gillian says, but she doesn’t offer anything else. 

“Studio,” Gillian observes, when Meghan lets her in.

“Why are you still talking?” Meghan asks, dropping her keys on the counter nearest the door. 

She’s starting to get antsy the longer Gillian goes without touching her, wondering if she’s pushed it too hard and Gillian’s not interested in fucking her after all. She can’t imagine why Gillian would bother to come home with her, then, but it unsettles her to feel as if she’s more interested than Gillian is. She’s had enough of being vulnerable in front of Gillian to last a lifetime, physically or not. 

Gillian stares at her for a few seconds, opens her mouth as if she’s going to speak, and then toes off her boots. Meghan is halfway through formulating a Canada chirp before Gillian’s pulling her in with one hand in Meghan’s coat collar.

Meghan’s split lip twinges when Gillian kisses her, but she loves it. She pushes back, gripping Gillian’s coat at her waist, and the kiss is all teeth for a few seconds with neither of them willing to give. Meghan bites down on Gillian’s lower lip and Gillian makes a surprised sound, pulling back and pushing Meghan away from her a few inches, without letting go of Meghan’s collar. Meghan maintains eye contact when she shrugs out of her coat and kicks her heels off. Gillian is significantly taller and bigger than her, and Meghan’s not sure which idea she likes better. She had intended to let Gillian push her around again, to really lean into it, but Gillian is just hesitant enough that Meghan is imagining the reverse now, pushing Gillian against the wall right here in the foyer and making her ask for it.

This time she’s the one to initiate, and her hands go right to Gillian’s shoulders. She’s well aware of exactly how strong Gillian is, but it’s another thing to feel it like this, where Gillian’s not trying to hurt her or beat her at something. Gillian’s hands go to her waist, and Meghan is acutely aware of how good her outfit is. She’s already imagining Gillian’s hands working to get her undressed, long, slender fingers unbuttoning her shirt and tugging her leggings down. It’s been a while since she’s done this. Some cities are easier than others to do it in, and she tends to get bored or tired and come back with Kacey before anything can happen; half the time the girls at the bar just think her and Kacey are together, and usually she doesn’t mind.

But tonight she minds. She doesn’t want Gillian to think or talk about Kacey, who’s at home nursing two cracked ribs. She doesn’t want Gillian to think about the two of them together. She wants Gillian to think about _this_ instead. The kiss doesn’t last long before Meghan opens her mouth to it, tilting her head back because Gillian is just taller enough that she needs to. It does what Meghan expects it to do, and Gillian leans closer, sliding her hand down to Meghan’s lower back in a gesture that’s almost possessive. Meghan enjoys it. She enjoys it at least half because she knows it’s only a matter of time before she turns it all on its head. The other half might have to do with her noticing how big Gillian’s hand is, how much of her lower back Gillian can cover with her fingers splayed out.

She lets Gillian kiss her like that for a while before she pushes back, and her lip twinges again when she pushes Gillian back against her front door and pulls Gillian’s coat over her shoulders. It gets stuck on Gillian’s shoulders, and even in the dark Meghan gets an eyeful of the way Gillian fills out her sweater. It’s a little bit too short. Meghan takes advantage of that when she presses back in, sliding her hand under Gillian’s sweater to rest against her absurdly toned stomach while Gillian tries to adjust to the change of pace.

It’s more than a little satisfying. Meghan kisses Gillian again, taking the opportunity to make it as slow and dirty as possible, and Gillian makes a soft noise against her mouth that’s a pleasant surprise this early in the game. After a while of that, Meghan works her thigh between Gillian’s, gratified by the height difference, which puts her hipbone just at Gillian’s inseam. She rocks her hips forward and Gillian gasps, reaching for the back of Meghan’s neck and digging her blunt nails in. Meghan breaks the kiss when Gillian’s hand leaves her neck, and she gets an eyeful then, a front row seat to the look on Gillian’s face when she fumbles down the buttons of Meghan’s shirt. Meghan hadn’t expected it, but Gillian is clearly comfortable like this, with Meghan in the driver’s seat.

She debates for a few seconds whether or not she should take Gillian to bed and decides against it. It’s not like that with them, and she doesn’t want to pretend that it is; the politics of this are weird already. Instead she yanks Gillian’s sweater up, and then freezes when it catches Gillian’s nose on the way off. Gillian winces, reaching up to touch it, and Meghan drops Gillian’s still-warm sweater to the floor guiltily.

“Sorry,” she says. 

“Weren’t when you broke it,” Gillian murmurs. It takes Meghan a second to realize Gillian’s chirping her, that the surly look on her face is a joke. 

“You gonna do something about it?” Meghan asks, and Gillian stares pointedly at Meghan’s split lip. Meghan stares back, taking in Gillian’s bland sports bra and her pale stomach, the way her jeans hug hips that Meghan would not have guessed were there. 

“Couch,” Meghan decides out loud, but Gillian doesn’t move, just runs a hand through her hair and waits for Meghan to come to her again.

-

Meghan pushes her with both hands at Gillian’s hips. Gillian lets it move her toward the couch, even though she could give Meghan more resistance if she wanted to. She doesn’t want to. She’s entirely content letting Meghan push her onto the couch. She sits and stares while Meghan shrugs out of her unbuttoned shirt. She’s wearing a nice bra, and Gillian is self consciously aware of the sports bra she has on. It’s a clean one, but it’s not cute or lacy like Meghan’s. She’s just resolved not to undress when Meghan tosses her hair over her shoulder and says, “Take your shirt off.”

Something in Gillian resents being told what to do, but it’s swallowed up by the urge to do what she’s told. Meghan knows what she wants, and Gillian’s along for the ride, enough that she pulls her sweater over her head and tries not to blush while Meghan looks her over.

It’s been over a year since Gillian did anything remotely resembling this. Meghan steps out of her leggings, and Gillian kicks off her jeans, trying to steel herself for the skin-on-skin contact that’s coming. It doesn’t work. Nothing could have prepared her for Meghan climbing into her lap, pushing her back against the back of the couch with both hands on her shoulders. Meghan is warm and strong and very, very intent on kissing her all of a sudden. It’s the most Gillian can do to get her arms around Meghan’s waist.

Meghan isn’t playing nice. She opens her mouth into the kiss early, and Gillian can taste Meghan’s blood on her lips. She almost pulls away to say something about it, but Meghan knows, and she’s an adult, and if Gillian is a little bit into it she’s not going to admit it. Meghan doesn’t seem to care that it must hurt. The dull throb of Gillian’s nose seems like something she can ignore if Meghan can ignore _that_. 

Meghan also had thought ahead enough to match her bra and underwear, and it strikes Gillian again that Meghan went out with the intention of taking someone home with her like this. That’s not hard to believe. What’s hard to believe is that she chose Gillian, who feels like she should probably be doing more. Meghan’s hands roam over Gillian’s shoulders and her chest, and Gillian exhales against Meghan’s collarbone, reaching up to flick open the clasp of her bra. Her ability to do that so quickly is a point of pride, so she’s a little bit crestfallen when Meghan doesn’t seem impressed, just shrugs out of her bra and tosses it away.

Gillian doesn’t get a chance to look or touch before Meghan’s arms are back around her neck and Meghan’s rocking into her lap, breathing hotly against her cheek and jaw. Gillian slides her hands from Meghan’s lower back up over her shoulders, but she doesn’t push Meghan away to get her hands on more skin. She doesn’t want to, not while Meghan is clearly after what she wants. And if Gillian’s being honest, Meghan moving against her is more than enough for her; she’s still processing the small things, like the obvious strength of Meghan’s thighs where she’s straddling her, and the faint scent of Meghan’s bodywash or shampoo.

Meghan leans back first. One of her hands is flat on Gillian’s chest, over her sternum, and she slides it up over Gillian’s throat, her heavy gaze focused on Gillian’s lips. Gillian’s lips might be swollen but they’re not as swollen as Meghan’s, which is starting to really bruise. Gillian’s afraid to kiss her again. Instead, while Meghan’s hand moves to her jaw, she takes the opportunity to brush the back of her hand across Meghan’s breast. Meghan reaches up for her wrist, and Gillian immediately worries that she’s done something wrong, that Meghan doesn’t want to be touched there.

Instead of pushing her away, Meghan takes that hand and slides it down her stomach, down the front of her underwear. Gillian has barely registered that it’s happening before she’s having to process something else: Meghan wants her.

She can’t help but wonder how long. She doesn’t ask, because Meghan still has ahold of her hand. She’s holding onto Gillian’s shoulder with her other hand so she can lean back, so Gillian can see, so they can _both_ watch while Meghan guides Gillian’s hand exactly where she wants it. When Gillian gets it right, when her fingertips are in exactly the right place, Meghan makes a sound so obscene that Gillian actually shudders.

Gillian loses track of time. Meghan lets go of her hand eventually, putting both hands on Gillian's shoulders to hold her in place while she rocks first against and then down onto Gillian’s hand. Gillian alternates between paying close attention to what she’s doing and paying close attention to Meghan in general. Meghan is the one to get fed up and get rid of her underwear, but she’s settling back in seconds, drawing Gillian’s hand back between her legs so that Gillian’s fingers are where she wants them again. Meghan knows what she wants, and her complete confidence drives Gillian crazy. Embarrassingly so. 

Watching Meghan’s thighs and abs flex while she holds herself in place on Gillian’s lap doesn’t help much. For a moment Gillian wonders how long Meghan can keep going like this, but then her forearm cramps so she adjust her wrist and in doing so she must hit an angle that really works. Meghan gasps, clawing at Gillian’s shoulders and the back of her neck. First Meghan goes silent, panting, and then finally her knees clamp against Gillian’s hips and she’s moaning so clearly that Gillian briefly worries about the little old lady a floor below. 

Gillian considers saying something, but it seems in bad taste. Meghan’s still wobbly when she pushes at Gillian’s shoulders again, this time so that Gillian ends up half sprawled onto her back. The couch isn’t really long enough, but if she props her knee up and lets her other leg hang off the edge of the couch, there’s just enough room for what Meghan wants. 

What Meghan wants is to place a hand flat on Gillian’s stomach and use the other to tug at Gillian’s underwear until she kicks it away. Getting fully unclothed with a hookup seems a little bit much, but they’re athletes, used to nakedness in the locker room, and somehow it just doesn’t feel too sudden. It might have more to do with how intent Meghan is on wrecking Gillian in at least one way tonight. 

She glances up when she touches Gillian between her legs, half as if she’s surprised and half as if she’s looking for something, some kind of permission. Gillian can’t open her mouth to speak or something more embarrassing will come out, but she closes her eyes and drops her head back against the arm of the couch and pushes her hips up into Meghan’s hand, and that’s enough. Meghan stops teasing her, and Gillian realizes very suddenly that Meghan has great hands, when they’re not trying to punch her. 

Gillian loses track of time. She was already a little bit sore and numb from the game, but she’s weak before she realizes it, grasping at the sofa with both hands while Meghan takes an audible breath. When the hand on Gillian’s stomach joins the first between Gillian’s legs so that Meghan can press her thumb against Gillian exactly where she needs it, Gillian snaps, turning her head to muffle her groan in her shoulder and upper arm. She doesn’t want to give Meghan the satisfaction of hearing her like this, but there’s really no dignity to be saved. Her entire body is shaking and rocking, and Meghan looks just a little bit smug, taking it all in. 

That doesn’t change the fact that it’s the best sex Gillian’s ever had. It’s something about the combination of the size of Meghan’s hands, how dexterous and confident she is, and the way they’ve been working each other up to this all night. Whatever it is, Gillian can’t believe how long she’s riding that wave, even after Meghan takes her hand back. When she opens her eyes Meghan is sitting back on her heels and half smirking to herself. 

“Well,” Gillian says, when she has some of her breath back, “that wasn’t terrible.”

“You’re an asshole,” Meghan says cheerfully, “lucky for you I know exactly how good I am, and you’re welcome.”

“Humble, too,” Gillian murmurs, sitting up and reaching for her underwear. 

Meghan rolls her eyes and stands so that she can scoop up her own clothes. Gillian follows her lead, and they don’t speak while they dress. It’s been a few years since Gillian has had a one night stand, and even then the girl slept over. Gillian had woken up to an empty bed and a headache so bad she couldn’t even call Jayna to complain about her terrible life choices. Somehow this feels like an even _worse_ life choice than getting fucked up on whiskey and taking a girl home from her sister’s wedding shower. And probably just as hard to live down.

“See you at Four Nations,” Meghan says, when Gillian is ready to leave.

“Is that the next time we play?” Gillian asks, “did you count?”

“Shut up,” Meghan says, but they’re both smiling a little bit again.

“Looking forward to kicking your ass again,” Gillian says.

“Good luck with that,” Meghan replies, and when Gillian turns to go she closes the door.

And that’s it. Gillian takes the train back to the team hotel. It doesn’t really hit her until she steps off, back into the cool air, tugging her jacket closer around her. She feels good, and that’s the part that bothers her the most. She should at least feel a little bit guilty, a little bit like she’s done something questionable, but she doesn’t. She feels good. 

She runs into Mo in the hallway, herding Auston and Mitch back toward their room. Mitch is drunker than Mo and Auston put together, which isn’t impressive given the fact that he’s smaller than either of them _or_ Gillian, but he’s a giddy drunk, and nobody really minds it.

“Thank God,” Mo says when he sees her, “can you handle this? I’m already hungover.”

Because, of course, as the woman on the squad, she’s the drunk babysitter. 

“Come on,” Gillian says, once Mo is gone, “tell me one of you remembered a hotel key card.”

“I got it,” Auston mumbles. He gets shy when he’s drunk, shy around Mitch especially, who insists on hanging on him with an arm around his shoulders. He’s a little pink when Mitch’s hand curls around the back of his neck. Gillian watches him try to fit the key card in the door for ten seconds, counting them, before she takes it out of his hand and lets them in.

“Where’d you go off to, Appsy?” Mitch asks, flopping back onto a bed. Gillian doesn’t think it’s his. That side of the room is too organized, and Auston looks at him for a long couple of seconds before he sits on the same bed, back up against the headboard. Gillian realizes he had taken off his shoes at the door, like her; Mitch’s are still on.

“They’re turning you into a good Canadian kid, eh?” she teases, nodding at Auston’s socked feet.

“Your beer sucks though,” he says.

“At least you’re old enough to drink it there,” Gillian shoots back, and he turns pink again.

“I went out,” Gillian says, to Mitch this time, “just like you guys did, just somewhere else.”

She leaves it at that. Mitch starts whistling something that she can sort of place but can’t quite name, and she’s about to leave when he stops abruptly and sits up, his short hair sticking out in at least four different directions.

“Appsy,” he says, “are you gay?”

“Mitch,” Auston says, panicking just a little bit. Gillian can tell that they’ve talked about it before, speculating, but she doesn’t really mind all that much. 

“We all are,” she says easily, leaning back in the desk chair, “didn’t they tell you guys?”

“No,” Mitch says, “I really don’t think that, but are you?” 

Auston kicks him, but he doesn’t stop. He’s very serious all of a sudden, leaning forward far enough on the edge of the bed that Gillian’s worried he’s going to slide off of it. Gillian thinks about Meghan, about both of them ending up at the same bar, about the things they share, and what Meghan’s seen.

“Yeah,” she says.

She doesn’t have anything else to say about it, so she doesn’t say anything else. Mitch nods a few times. Auston continues to look mortified, and Gillian asks if it was really his question.

“Cool,” Mitch says, “hey, that’s awesome.”

“It is awesome,” Gillian agrees, thinking of Meghan again, wishing she had pushed it just a bit longer, maybe gotten Meghan off a second time before she left.

“Alright,” she says, getting to her feet, “both of you, drink two full bottles of water before you go to bed or you’re not allowed to whine at me tomorrow.”

“Okay, Mom,” they reply to her in chorus, back to exactly how she expected them to. She leaves the room with a middle finger up, laughing.

-

“You look pleased with yourself,” Kacey says, over breakfast the next morning.

“Are you out for the next game?” Meghan asks, ignoring her. She _is_ pleased with herself.

“Yeah,” Kacey says, “but they think it’ll just be the one. Nothing broken, one cracked, but we’re not playing a team with anyone big like that who’ll hit me for a while, so I’m fine to play with it if I rest for a bit. Probably less ice time, for a while, though.”

“Fuck,” Meghan says, “that sucks, Kace.”

“It’s fine,” Kacey says diplomatically, the way she always says it when she wants Meghan to tell her that it’s not fine and she should be righteously upset about something. 

“It’s not fine,” Meghan says, “you started that last game and now your ice time is gonna be cut back because you got crunched, that’s bullshit. She didn’t have to hit you like that.”

She’s mad again, but not to the point that she’s disgusted with herself for sleeping with Gillian. Somehow the Gillian on the ice--the one who had hurt Kacey and punched Meghan in the face--is different than the one Meghan took home with her. She knows it’s naive to feel that way about it, but she doesn’t know how to switch it off. 

“It’s the game,” Kacey says, “this shit happens to guys all the time, on any team, any line. It’s part of the men’s--I mean, it’s part of the NHL game. And I signed up for that, so.”

She shrugs. Meghan sighs. 

“Thanks for trying to punch her though,” Kacey says. “You made all the headlines this morning.”

“Stop,” Meghan says, “we barely made SportsCenter.”

“We?” Kacey asks, and Meghan can feel herself go pink. Kacey’s jaw drops.

“Tell me you didn’t fuck her,” Kacey says, “tell me my intuition is wrong and you didn’t do that.”

Meghan doesn’t. She takes a long drink of her bloody mary and raises her eyebrows at Kacey, who sighs dramatically.

“I don’t know what I expected,” Kacey says.

“Don’t say that like I do this all the time,” Meghan says, “it’s gauche.”

“Shut up,” Kacey says, “God, just because we’re at brunch doesn’t mean you’re classy all of a sudden. I can’t believe you took a Canadian home with you. Now you have to see her at Worlds and when we play Toronto again and you’ll be thinking about _that_.”

“No,” Meghan says, “I’ll be thinking about the game, and _she’ll_ be thinking about sex with me. It’s actually a brilliant strategy, and you’re welcome.”

Kacey lets it go, but Meghan doesn’t. She’s listening, during the rest of brunch, but she’s also thinking about Gillian, thinking about the night before and how it hadn’t felt like enough time. Meghan had thought about asking her to stay a little longer. There were a lot of things Meghan had wanted to do that she hadn’t gotten the chance to do, and Kacey’s right. She knows Meghan well enough to know that she’s thinking about it. The difference between them is that Meghan knows she’ll forget the second she steps on the ice.

She has to.

-

Gillian hates Four Nations.

Well, she doesn’t hate Four Nations. She hates _this_ tournament. And she hates playing Russia. For the third time in the game, deep in the second period, a Russian sticks her in the face. With her full bucket on Gillian doesn’t feel it, but it’s annoying, and it’s more annoying that nothing is getting called on her. She knows it’s because she’s big. It doesn’t make her any less annoyed about it.

During a timeout, up five goals, her eyes wander while she listens to the coach giving directions. She catches sight of a row of Americans near the top of the bowl, in their matching navy jackets, half of them blonde and with their arms crossed, and finds herself looking for Meghan. When she picks Meghan out, it aggravates her even more, and she’s not sure if she’s more annoyed at herself for looking or at Meghan for being there. But she’s got the C. Of course she would be here. They don’t play for hours yet.

The next time a Russian settles in front of her and starts to give her trouble, Gillian is pissed enough that she does something stupid and pushes back. If she did it with only one hand, with the hand not holding her stick, she might have gotten away with it, too. The girl is shorter enough that when Gillian touches her with both hands--even just barely--she goes sprawling onto her face, selling it hard, like a cross-check to the back of the head, and Gillian is already mentally berating herself before the whistle blows.

“Oh, come _on_ ,” she says. The ref ignores her. He’s a good two inches shorter than her, and she hates that playing in the NHL has made her notice that. 

“She high-sticked me,” Gillian mumbles on her way to the box. None of her teammates are looking at her. It doesn’t matter up by this much, but it’s not a good look. She’s a veteran now. Penalties like this are ones for kids to take.

From the box, she watches Meghan and the Americans get up to leave. Meghan lingers, and Gillian looks away, back to the play, before they can make eye contact. She chomps on her mouth guard until she’s worried that she’s going to ruin it, and when she checks again, Meghan is gone. They win the game, of course, but Gillian doesn’t contribute much, and she feels like she’s jumping out of her skin.

-

It’s a short tournament. It’s too short to get up to any trouble, and even if it wasn’t, Meghan has already made a pact with herself not to fraternize with Gillian while she’s on, as she likes to think of it, a business trip. It’s disloyal, it’s distracting, and she doesn’t need it. 

She’s still drawn to Gillian with a magnetism that both puzzles and annoys her. Even on the ice, she’s hyperaware of how close or far she is from Gillian at any given time. After her best opportunity of the prelim against Canada, Jocelyne taps the back of Meghan’s knee with her stick to make it clear her one-handed effort up the center was noticed. Meghan drifts slowly past the Canada bench on the way to her own seat. She doesn’t look at Gillian, but she can feel herself taking her time, and she wants Gillian to see her. She knows Gillian is there.

“You’re not gonna sleep with her here, are you?” Kacey asks her after the game, their heads bent together on the bus so nobody will hear them.

“No,” Meghan hisses, “who do you think I am?”

“I’m choosing to ignore that question,” Kacey says.

“I have a job to do,” Meghan says, “I have a letter, I have to set an example, I can’t waltz over to a Team Canada forward and ask her to--”

“Alright,” Kacey says, “I got it. So, you’re just--you just pretend nothing’s happening?”

“Nothing _is_ happening,” Meghan insists. “She doesn’t even have my number.”

“Oh,” Kacey says, and leans back in her seat.

Meghan feels it, too. She’s completely missed a vital part of what’s necessary for her to ever get Gillian alone again. Somehow she needs to get Gillian her number before this tournament is over, or she might miss her window. She’s not sure when the next time they play Toronto is, but she doesn’t want Gillian to think she was only interested in a one-time thing, because, surprising even herself (but apparently not Kacey), she’s not. 

She still wants to punch Gillian in the face, but less. She wouldn’t hang out with Gillian, or at least she doesn’t think she would want to. 

Gillian should still have her number.

Meghan scrawls it on one of the little hotel notepads they leave on the bedside table, and she keeps it with her even though she has no idea when she’d get the chance to pass it off. 

Ultimately, it happens when she least expects it to. It’s been years since the two teams stayed in the same hotel, but this year the hotels are right across the street from each other, which is just as bizarre as staying in the same place. They get to watch Canada file into their bus for the gold medal game while they file into their own. It feels like a competition. The whole time Meghan is looking for Gillian, and when they arrive the buses have to park so close that everyone is awkwardly trying to avoid each other.

Everyone except people who went to school together, with the awkward, stilted nods that say they’ll meet up later. Meghan doesn’t look too out of place when she purposely bumps into Gillian, trying to make it look like an accident; Gillian turns and starts to apologize to who she probably expects will be a stranger, and Meghan presses the little piece of paper into Gillian’s hand.

“Sorry,” she says, just for show.

“Uh,” Gillian says, shoving her hand into her pocket, “yeah.”

Eloquent. Meghan’s grinning to herself when she rejoins her team, and Kacey rolls her eyes but doesn’t ask.


	2. Chapter 2

Gillian is a little nervous. She tells herself it’s because it’s a sold out home game and her dad dropping the puck, but she knows it’s more about having to see Meghan again. Meghan, who never called or texted her. Gillian keeps telling herself she shouldn’t be so stunned by it. It’s not like they went on a date, not like Meghan _likes_ her, but Gillian is still nervous, and jealous of Meghan and Kacey for not being alone on their team. 

Tonight is a night where Gillian wonders about her decision to be a Maple Leaf. 

“I’ll rotate you in,” Babcock tells her, “fourth line, when they play Duggan.”

She hates that she wants to ask for more than that. She knows how lucky she is to have it at all. Mitch finds her when they’re ready to leave the ice after warmups and she does their stupid handshake reluctantly, aware, somehow for the first time, that people can see them. 

“It’s stupid that they won’t let you take the faceoff,” Auston says in the tunnel, over his shoulder. 

“Shhh,” Gillian says. 

“I mean, it’s _your dad_ ,” he continues. 

“Doesn’t matter,” Gillian says, “just, let’s focus on the game.”

“Hope you score one tonight,” Mitch says, tapping the back of her knee with his stick.

Hockey is a game of goals and points for Mitch. It’s not that kind of game for her. She watches the ceremonial puck drop and gets a hug after that has the whole arena clapping for them. It’s the last time anyone gets to applaud for almost 20 minutes of gritty, dirty hockey. Boston always plays like that, but Duggan is getting more ice time than usual and Babcock is frustrated at how often he’s having to put Gillian out. She can tell before he stops rolling her every time. 

“Stay,” he says, and she watches Meghan deke around Jake like it’s nothing. 

“She’s good,” Mitch says, “when she’s not hitting you.”

“Shut up,” Gillian says, moments before he leaves the bench for the ice.

Dom ends up in the box twenty seconds into her second shift. 

“Let me stay out,” she says at the bench, and her teammates go silent. Babcock seems more surprised than anything else. Gillian wonders how many times she’s actually spoken directly to him.

“Let me stay out,” she repeats, “I’m big, I’ll block whatever, I don’t care.”

“Alright,” he says, “I don’t really care, just get out there, guys, let’s go.”

Her heart is in her throat for the first ten seconds. She plays up high, challenging the point, because she knows he wasn’t expecting _her_ to be out there. She’s not sure she’s ever seen a woman on the penalty kill. She knows someone will have the stats on it later.

She can hear her own heartbeat in her ears when Krug fumbles the puck. She’s not fast, not nearly fast enough for what she’s about to try, but she’s on her toes already and his eyes are down and her father is in the stands with their name on the back of his jersey. _Her_ name. So she steals the puck.

He’s faster than her and she knows it. She’s never skated so fast in her life. She can hear Matt behind her, to her right, telling her to keep going, and she can hear Krug on her tail, and the crowd building up around her. Rask comes out to the edge of the crease to cut her angle, and she’s coming at him hard from the right and she knows she needs to get around to the other side on her forehand, but she’s too close to him and half trips on his skate when he reaches out to poke check her, missing by centimeters. She puts the puck on frame and prays.

And it goes in.

She hits the ice on her left shoulder and it hurts, but Matt is already on top of her, and the crowd is roaring, and the shutout is broken. She gets hauled to her feet, and she has to pass the Bruins bench on her way to get fist bumps. Meghan and Kacey are both grinning at her, but when Gillian makes eye contact they both try to hide it. She’s done with her shift after that, taking her place next to Mitch, and Auston reaches over him to smother the front of her cage with his smelly glove.

“What a fuckin’ beaut, Mom,” Mitch says.

“Stop fucking calling me that,” Gillian laughs.

She looks up to watch the replay and catches sight of her father on the screen, wiping his eyes, and it’s the first time since her grandfather’s funeral that she’s seen him cry. She ends up swallowing a lump in her throat, and Mitch claps her helmet, drapes an arm over her shoulders.

Babcock doesn’t say anything to her, but she wasn’t expecting him to. He’s coaching, after all. And they’re still down a goal.

-

The game gets chippy after Gillian’s goal. Chippier than normal. Meghan gets pushed around a bit in a corner, and it’s not Gillian who does it. She doesn’t mind--in fact she prefers it, likes that a man is bothering to put some body on her, because it means she’s playing well--but when she pushes back after the puck goes out of play he looks startled, and she takes in the A on his jersey before the ref is moving between them. It wasn’t that kind of push, and Meghan is a little bit irritated, enough not to skate away immediately, to resist the ref’s hand on her chest. The two of them skate toward their respective benches so that the faceoff can be set up, and Meghan drifts just close enough to him that he gives her a dirty look.

“Fucking bitch,” he says, in front of both of their benches, loud enough for the ends to hear.

Meghan laughs in his face. He doesn’t seem to like that much, because he says something else to her, but Kacey and Brandon are banging their sticks on the boards and laughing with her so she doesn’t hear it. 

Gillian’s goal stands as the only one for Toronto. It’s always nice to beat someone at home, but Meghan doesn’t feel it as much when she remembers Gillian’s father on the big screen. She gets the third star of the game, though, and Meghan’s pretty sure that other than Amanda, nobody else like them has gotten recognition like that at all. She tries to keep the smile off her face when she sees it on Twitter, but she’s sort of imagining it, the whole arena clapping just for a woman in their colors.

Not because it’s Gillian.

“You’re a mess,” Kacey says, matter-of-fact.

“You should talk,” Meghan says.

“I’m not a mess right now,” Kacey says, “and you are, so I’m going to bask in it. You _like_ her.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Meghan says. Kacey’s going to call her on her bullshit later, and she knows it, but she lets it slide for now and Meghan is grateful. She tries three different texts before she settles on one that doesn’t feel too eager.

‘show me around toronto? or do i have to fight you first?’

She gets a text back in seconds, like Gillian was waiting for it.

‘losing a fight to me wouldn’t hurt’

Meghan smirks at her phone and Kacey rolls her eyes. She leads the way out into the hall, and Meghan pockets her phone, wanting it to be away for the trip to the bus in case someone gets a picture of her. The last thing she needs is Gillian gloating about Meghan texting her on camera. Back on the bus, pressed between Kacey and the window, she checks her phone again. There’s an address this time, but nothing about timing, nothing else. Gillian is, apparently, not even going to buy her a drink first. 

Meghan isn’t sure that she minds it.

-

“Coming out with us?” Freddie asks. His hair is flat alongside one half of his head from how he’s showered, and Gillian resists the urge to tell him or to fix it. She doesn’t need her nickname to rear back up right after she’s finally proven she can put the puck in the back of the net.

“Nah,” she says, “I’m--” she hesitates. She knows how the guys would talk to each other about a situation like hers, but whether or not she can or wants to talk about it the same was isn’t something she’s ever considered.

“I have plans,” she finishes lamely, hoping he’ll fill in the blanks himself.

“Oh yeah,” he says, “your family and all that.”

How can she tell him that there’s nothing? Her parents have never been like that. Nobody in her family is much good at spending time together, other than her and her sister. Everyone else finds it easier to express any sort of feelings from afar. Besides which, they lost the game; Gillian’s first NHL goal will be worth a few minutes of chatting, but it’s not the Olympics, and she’s not a kid. 

How can she tell Freddie that she’s expecting a brusque hug from her dad, a tearful one from her mom, and the evening to herself?

Meghan to herself.

She just nods at him, managing half a smile, but Auston sees right through it.

“You’re up to something,” he says, bumping his shoulder against hers.

“She has _plans_ ,” Mitch repeats, on her other side. She’s not sure how she ended up being their unlikely sidekick. It’s only a matter of time before their own team’s media catches on and sticks her on camera with them. She can feel her phone buzz in her jacket pocket, but she refuses to check in front of them.

“Sounds sexy,” Auston says.

“Totally,” Mitch agrees, “she totally has a date.”

“It is not a date,” Gillian says, trying to speed up, not that she’ll escape them regardless.

“No, c’mon,” Auston says, “you don’t go on a date after a goal like that, Mitchy. I’m surprised she wasn’t looking in the stands the whole time to flex for this girl.”

Gillian hesitates. That’s a moment where it was really important for her to chirp back so as not to incriminate herself, and she knows it, knows it so much that she hesitates trying to formulate it, thinking about Meghan, and of course Auston catches it.

“Unless,” he says suddenly, “she wasn’t in the stands at all.”

“No way,” Mitch says.

“Shut up,” Gillian hisses, beelining for the parking lot.

“Okay,” Mitch says, “so there’s two girls on that team.”

“It’s got to be Bellamy,” Auston says. Gillian is determined to ignore them, but the thought of that makes her make a face. It’s a reflex, and she’s about to start sprinting to her car before she incriminates herself _more_.

“Can’t be Duggan,” Auston continues, “because she punched you in the face.”

“Unless Appsy’s into that,” Mitch says, and Auston laughs. When Gillian doesn’t, he stops, grabbing her bag to stop her, too.

“No way,” he says.

“No _way_ ,” Mitch parrots.

“Look,” Gillian says, as if she has any kind of explanation for herself, “it’s not like--we’ve played against each other for years. It’s not about me liking getting punched in the face.”

“She’s really hot,” Auston says, “I see the appeal.”

“You guys cannot say anything to anyone,” Gillian pleads, “seriously, I don’t think she’s told anyone, and it’s not like--a thing. It’s just a thing we do. We’re not going out or anything.”

“Oh,” Mitch says, and then he repeats it, extending the sound.

“We won’t say anything,” Auston says, “we’re your friends, your conquests are safe with us.”

Gillian objects to the use of the word, especially because, if she’s being honest, Meghan is the one doing the conquesting, but she doesn’t have the time or energy to have a conversation about phrasing, so she thanks them instead. They finally let her go, and she takes a deep breath in the cold darkness of her Jetta before she turns the key.

-

Gillian’s answers the door with a glass in her hand, and Meghan eyes it immediately, half so that she doesn’t have to look at Gillian in her button-down. There was no reason for her to put something like that on. Meghan says so.

“Took the blazer off,” Gillian says. “I had a postgame interview.”

“Because of your goal,” Meghan observes, deciding that it must be whiskey in Gillian’s glass.

“Because of my dad,” Gillian corrects, then takes a drink. She notices Meghan watching her--mostly watching Gillian swallow--and presses her lips together.

“You want something to drink?” Gillian asks.

Meghan almost says no. This is feeling more like a date every second, and that’s not why she thought she was coming over. But Gillian looks good in her button down and slacks, and Meghan doesn’t mind drinking.

“What do you have?” she asks.

“Whatever you want,” Gillian says.

“Well,” Meghan replies, flipping her hair over her shoulder, “what do you think I want?”

Gillian considers her carefully. She looks Meghan over, head to toe, and Meghan feels the warmth in her stomach spreading. 

“You look like a gin and tonic girl,” Gillian says. 

“Boring?” Meghan suggests incredulously, “I look _boring_?”

Gillian laughs. She disappears into her kitchen, and Meghan stands around in the foyer feeling awkward. Gillian has a real apartment, not a studio; it’s expensive but she’s made it homey with furniture that looks older and decorations that aren’t the standard ones that all of Meghan’s friends own. She returns with a beer and opens it in front of Meghan with a bottle opener that she sets aside immediately after. 

“What is it?” Meghan asks, taking the bottle warily. She looks at the label, not sure what to expect, but it’s not a brand she recognizes.

“Just trust me,” Gillian says, “it’s good. You’ll like it.”

“What’s the alcohol content?” Meghan asks, but she’s already moving to take a sip. It is good. But then, she knew Gillian had good taste. She did invite her over. 

“If I wanted to get you drunk,” Gillian says, “we would be doing shots.”

Meghan raises her eyebrows and drinks again. Gillian does too, and Meghan looks away so that she doesn’t have to see the way Gillian is looking at her. She wanders over to the coffee table and leans down to look at a framed picture there. 

“Are you the middle child?” Meghan asks. Gillian is as tall as her brother, and right now she’s looking over Meghan, who’s trying not to think about it. 

“Youngest,” Gillian says, “that’s my big sister, she’s just a shrimp.”

“Explains a lot,” Meghan says, standing up straight again. They’re close together now, close enough that Meghan can smell the alcohol on Gillian’s breath. 

“You must be a middle child,” Gillian says, and Meghan smirks. 

“Because I’m normal?” Meghan asks, and Gillian puts her drink down on the coffee table, straightening up in a way that tells Meghan in no uncertain terms that she’s about to be kissed. 

“Because you’re a brat,” Gillian says, and reaches out, pulling Meghan to her with a hand cupping her jaw. 

Meghan kisses her back eagerly, and it’s only a few seconds in that she remembers the beer in her hand. She only remembers because Gillian has reached for it and is setting it aside, and that gesture, the insistence that all of Meghan’s focus be on _her_ , is what makes Meghan’s knees weak first.

She steadies herself with her hands on Gillian’s elbows, and Gillian pulls her closer, enough that their knees bump. Meghan no longer has the urge to push Gillian away and climb on top of her. Gillian has a firm hand on her lower back and another on her shoulder, and Meghan is suddenly more than content with that, with being directed. Not that she’d ever admit it. She doesn’t have to, at least not with Gillian. She’s pretty sure Gillian will be able to tell. 

Gillian breaks the kiss first, sliding one hand up to cup the back of Meghan’s head and immediately kissing Meghan’s neck. Meghan gets goosebumps and hates herself for it, but Gillian’s hand is so big, and she’s not being rough, and it’s nothing like Meghan had expected. She cranes her neck, half to give Gillian some trouble and half to judge how far she needs to back up to get to the couch. When she starts to, Gillian pulls back again, and her eyes are dark. 

“No,” she says, and Meghan’s jaw almost drops. 

-

Meghan looks scandalized. Gillian blushes and prays that Meghan can’t tell without enough light. She rugs on the collar of Meghan’s jacket. 

“I’m too tall,” she says, “for the couch.”

It’s only half true. There are a lot of things they could do on her couch that don’t involve her laying on it. Meghan knows this, because they did some on _her_ couch, but she doesn’t say anything and Gillian is grateful. She wants Meghan in her bed so she can have as much space as she needs. She wants Meghan in her bed just for the image, if she’s being honest with herself, but it’s been her policy so far with Meghan to tell the truth as rarely as possible.

Meghan follows her. She can hear that Meghan’s rustling with her clothes on the way, and when they get to Gillian’s room Meghan drops her coat and toes off her slip-ons. Gillian almost says something about American manners, but she has to kick off her own shoes, so there would be no punch to it. 

Meghan makes eye contact with Gillian when she pulls her sweater over her head. Gillian’s eyes drift, and she takes in Meghan’s bra, the lace around the decolletage. Meghan put that on for her. For _this_.

“Can’t even buy a couch that fits you?” Meghan asks.

“Shut up,” Gillian says, and closes the space between them. She pulls Meghan to her with a hand cupping the back of Meghan’s neck, and Meghan grins against Gillian’s mouth, delighted. Gillian is both annoyed and flustered by that, but she loses her edge when Meghan reaches up and starts unbuttoning her shirt. The shirt and slacks was a good idea. There’s more for Meghan’s hands to do and less for her mouth to do.

“Your goal was highlight-reel worthy,” Meghan says, dragging her cool fingertips against Gillian’s chest while she works, “but I never said that.”

“I’m going to tell everyone,” Gillian murmurs. She’s just holding onto Meghan’s hips now, watching Meghan’s long, slender fingers make quick work of her buttons.

“Nobody’s going to believe you,” Meghan says cheerfully. She doesn’t push Gillian’s shirt over her shoulders. Instead she thumbs the button of Gillian’s slacks open, and trails her open mouth along Gillian’s jaw while she toys with the zipper. Meghan wants to touch her badly. Gillian doesn’t let her. She reaches down for Meghan’s wrist and pushes with her free hand on Meghan’s hip, spinning them so that she can back Meghan toward the bed. Meghan is still smiling when she drops herself back onto the mattress. 

Gillian stays standing and pulls Meghan toward the edge of the bed with both hands on Meghan’s thighs, just above her knees. Meghan lets herself be pulled, and Gillian reaches for the button on Meghan’s jeans. She doesn’t take her time like Meghan did, because she has no interest in teasing. She pulls Meghan’s jeans down over her hips and lets Meghan kick them away, because she’s busy, sliding her hands along Meghan’s hips and stomach, taking in the view she didn’t really get to enjoy the first time. Meghan has a bruise developing on her lower ribcage, but Gillian doesn’t remember seeing her get hit.

She must stare, because Meghan smirks.

“Not a hockey injury,” she offers. 

Gillian wonders if it’s a sex injury, if Meghan’s sleeping with other people, and she feels a rush of jealousy that startles her. It’s not like they’re seeing each other. Of course Meghan must be sleeping with other people. It’s her prerogative. Gillian could do it too, if she could be bothered to. She wants to get on her knees and pull Meghan to her mouth, but that isn’t the vibe she’s going for, so she places her hand on Meghan’s stomach and slides it up over her bra to rest against Meghan’s chest, just at the base of her neck, as she moves to stand between Meghan’s knees. Meghan sits up, reaching for Gillian’s shoulder, and Gillian’s hand goes to the back of Meghan’s neck again when she leans back down to kiss her.

She doesn’t usually enjoy getting like this, but Meghan’s been pissing her off all night, and she wants Meghan to want this, to want _her_. She wants Meghan to be impressed by her goal. She wants Meghan to forget whoever gave her that bruise. She wants to be the only thing Meghan can think about.

Meghan twists so that she can unhook her bra and toss it away, and Gillian pushes her until she moves back to the middle of the bed. When Gillian steps out of her slacks she notices the way that Meghan’s eyes are wandering over her legs, and she doesn’t give herself time to enjoy it before she’s climbing on top of Meghan, pressing her into the mattress. Meghan is handsy, reaching around to slide both hands down the back of Gillian’s underwear, and Gillian ends up pinning Meghan’s hands to the mattress so that she can focus. Meghan makes a delighted noise, squirming under Gillian, and Gillian’s stomach flips. Meghan likes being held down. After the first time they slept together Gillian would never have guessed. When Gillian kisses Meghan again, Meghan opens her mouth into the kiss immediately, and Gillian’s hips jerk forward into Meghan’s without her really meaning to.

Meghan responds eagerly, so Gillian ends up rocking her hips into Meghan, holding herself up with both hands clasped firmly around Meghan’s wrists, not tight enough to hurt but with the clear intention to keep her still. It doesn’t really work, because Meghan moves her hips up against Gillian. Gillian pulls both of Meghan’s hands up above her head, together, and holds her wrists loosely in one hand while she reaches down with the other to push Meghan’s hip into the bed. Meghan gasps, breaking the kiss, turning her head so that she can squirm. She’s bright pink, and the blush is starting to creep down her neck into her collarbones and chest. Gillian holds Meghan like that for a few seconds, following the blush, kissing Meghan’s neck and working up a red spot on Meghan’s shoulder.

When she lets go of Meghan’s wrists, Meghan reaches for her, and Gillian lets it happen. She likes one of Meghan’s hands in her hair. It’s not demanding, just there, and Gillian is taking her time now that she has Meghan strung out like this, unfocused and sloppy. 

When she sits back on her heels to tug at Meghan’s underwear, Meghan fixes her with a hazy, needy look that makes Gillian feel like every inch of her is made of Jello. She manages to get Meghan’s underwear off, but she’s gentler and more tender than she means to be when she puts her hand between Meghan’s legs. She explores at first, given that the last time they did this Meghan took exactly what she wanted right away, and Meghan is quiet, finally, clutching the sheets in both hands. When Gillian’s thumb brushes over her in just the right way, Meghan whines, but she keeps her mouth closed and does her best to muffle it that way.

Gillian repeats the gesture, adding pressure with her thumb until Meghan’s quiet, halting sounds are fully vocalized. It’s not enough, and not sustained enough pressure for Meghan to get much out of it, but it’s _good_. Gillian is glad, and far enough gone to admit that she wants this to be good enough for Meghan not to even consider having sex with someone else in the break between times that they play each other.

She doesn’t question that. She’s too busy letting up on the pressure, listening to Meghan sigh frustratedly through her nose. When Gillian turns her hand over and touches Meghan again, Meghan lifts her hips clear off the bed in an attempt to get Gillian to stop fucking around. Gillian doesn’t take the bait right away. Instead she bends down and cranes her neck and scrapes her teeth over the fading bruise, making it livid again, only this time it’s Gillian’s. Meghan groans, writhing, caught between Gillian’s fingers and her insistent mouth.

“Fuck,” Meghan murmurs, and Gillian straightens her fingers out. Meghan claws at her upper back, heels digging into the bed while she tries to adjust, and Gillian, as eager as she is to hear and feel Meghan fall apart around her, allows for that time.

When Meghan’s hands and legs relax against her, Gillian starts to move. She sits back at first, to watch Meghan’s face, but Meghan’s eyelashes are fluttering and Gillian wants to see up close, so she drops down to hold herself up on one arm. Their upper bodies are moving together, and Meghan is just trying to hold onto Gillian, which is, Gillian realizes, exactly what she wanted. She doesn’t kiss Meghan again, because Meghan is trying to breathe. When she twists her wrists and Meghan shakes apart around her, both arms wrapped around her neck and shoulders, it feels almost as good as the goal had.

If she were in an honest mood it might have felt better.

Gillian doesn’t slow or let up until Meghan’s hips jump against hers again, and the second time goes on longer, and Meghan is louder, filling the usually-quiet apartment with the sound of her hoarse groans. Then Gillian does lean back onto her heels, and she takes a few seconds to appreciate her handiwork. The great Meghan Duggan splayed out on her bed, a wreck. 

“Take a picture,” Meghan says eventually, “it’ll last longer.”

“Don’t tempt me unless you mean it,” Gillian says.

“You wish,” Meghan says. She stretches her legs out, which is entirely for Gillian’s benefit. Gillian feels a lot less annoyed at Meghan after all that. It lasts about two seconds before Meghan speaks again.

“Want me to get you off?” she asks.

“Wow,” Gillian replies, “chivalry’s not dead. No, you can go.”

She’s not even sure why she’s annoyed. It was a simple question. 

Well, the real issue is that she knows exactly why she’s annoyed, and there’s no logic to it. 

“Hey,” Meghan says, “don’t be like that, I’m serious.”

“Wouldn’t want to put you out,” Gillian says, getting to her feet. She’s working on her button-down, which she had never taken off, when Meghan stops her with one hand on both of hers.

“Don’t be an asshole,” Meghan says, “you know I want to. I didn’t want to be presumptuous. I was trying to be nice.”

Gillian knows. Going back on it now, though, now that she’s made an effort to be an asshole, would be more embarrassing than anything else. The thing is, she wants Meghan badly enough that she’s considering it. Meghan must know. It seems like she knows everything. She pushes Gillian’s hands away from the shirt and pulls Gillian to her with her _own_ hands fisted into the halves. 

“I can be mean,” Meghan says, looking up at Gillian through her eyelashes, “if you’d prefer.”

“You’re a pest,” Gillian says, as if the way Meghan’s looking at her hasn’t made her knees weak.

“You love it,” Meghan says, because she’s sliding her hand down the front of Gillian’s underwear, so she knows exactly how Gillian feels about it. Now that there’s no hiding it, Gillian feels less inclined to push Meghan away, so she doesn’t. She lets Meghan push her underwear over her hips and she holds herself up until her arms and the rest of her are shaking, and Meghan doesn’t even look smug that it barely took three minutes, when it’s all over. 

Gillian makes the mistake of collapsing half on top of Meghan after, half out of necessity, breathing against Meghan’s neck. It only lasts a second before she comes back to herself enough to be sheepish, like she’s done something really embarrassing. She rolls onto her back next to Meghan, who doesn’t immediately get up and look for her clothes. Instead she props herself up on one elbow, and Gillian tries very hard not to look at Meghan, who she still wants, still aches for. It’s not like indulging in a craving, having a handful of dark chocolate and being satisfied. She wants to roll back over and lose herself in Meghan again.

It’s hard to hit the panic button in your own home. It’s not like Gillian can leave.

“It really was a nice goal,” Meghan says. Gillian had actually forgotten, somehow, and when she remembers she gets a thrill all over again. 

“Thanks,” Gillian says. She hates the way her voice sounds like this. It’s dropped another octave.

Meghan seems like she wants to say something. She’s looking Gillian up and down again, and Gillian is glad she still has her slacks on--pulled back up-- and her shirt still on, even if it’s unbuttoned. Somehow she feels as though the less Meghan sees of her right now, the better.

“Well,” Meghan says, eventually, after chewing her lips for another twenty seconds, “see you around, I guess.”

Gillian tries to remember when the next time is, but Meghan already knows.

“Worlds,” she says, standing and stretching her arms over her head. She hasn’t put anything back on yet and Gillian suddenly and intensely wants to roll over and push her face into her own pillow.

“Edmonton,” Gillian says uselessly.

“You know where to find me,” Meghan says. It’s a sentence that should sound like a chirp, but it doesn’t. It’s almost a little bit sad. Gillian needs a lot more alcohol to grapple with that, or to forget it--and she knows which one she’s going to choose. There’s no reason to feel like that about this. There’s no reason to feel like _anything_ about this. 

She can’t think of anything to say before Meghan is dressed and gone. 

-

“So,” Brad says, leaning against his stick, “I hear you really like playing Toronto.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Meghan says around her mouthguard. His is sticking out of his mouth while he chews on it, she can see it out of the corner of her eye. He knows it drives her nuts, and she knows that’s why he does it when he’s standing this close to her.

“Bells didn’t tell me,” he says, “if that’s what you’re worried about.”

“I’m not worried about it,” Meghan says, “because there’s nothing to worry about, and even if there was, Kacey would die before she told anyone anything like that. I have enough dirt on her to bury her alive.”

Brad laughs and twists to stretch, and Meghan does the same, still avoiding eye contact. The last thing she needs is for him to see the panic she’s feeling. If Kacey didn’t tell him--and Meghan knows that she didn’t--then how did Brad find out? Is she that obvious?

“Damn,” he says, “you don’t even want to know how I know?”

“There’s nothing to--”

“Come on,” he cuts her off, “I’m dumb as shit, but even I’m not that dumb.”

Meghan pulls her hands behind her head to stretch her arms, and it occurs to her too late that Gillian might have been the one to spill it. She’s not sure how she feels about it. She knows she should be pissed, or at least annoyed, and she is, but there’s a part of her that’s a little tickled by the idea of Gillian being unable to keep things to herself. It’s an ego thing.

“Some of the Toronto rookies have big mouths,” Brad says.

“Nosy shits,” Meghan mumbles, and Brad laughs.

“Come on,” he says, “the most drama this league has seen has always been all about who has the biggest beef with some other guy. Contracts, money, boring shit. This is exciting for us.”

“I don’t want to be the subject of rumours,” Meghan says.

“Rumor has it you have her wrapped around your finger,” Brad says, “so I don’t think that’s a bad rumor to own.”

Meghan can feel her mouth quirk up in a smile before she can stop herself. The idea of Gillian--big, strong, broody Gillian--being wrapped around her finger...it’s satisfying. It might be a little more than just satisfying.

“Bad joke,” Brad says, “right? That’s a bad joke.”

Meghan nudges the back of Brad’s knee with her stick until he wobbles, still laughing. Of all the ways for this to come out, she had expected a lot more flack than what she’s getting, and the sensation of escape makes her giddy.

“I’m not confirming anything,” she says, but she’s sure that the look on her face gives her away.

-

When Gillian sees Meghan again in person, not in a video or a picture, she’s a little breathless trying to come to terms with the fact of what they’ve done together multiple times. It still feels like batting way above her average. And, other than a few cursory back-and-forth chirpy texts, it’s not like Meghan has spoken to her, not like she’s indicated that she’s interested in doing anything going forward, so Gillian can only sneak glances at her and wonder.

She’s supposed to be watching the game, not Meghan. They’re there to watch a period before they go warm up for their own game, but Gillian can’t make herself feign interest in anything other than watching Meghan skate. Things that are intensely normal and boring are intense and interesting when it’s Meghan doing them, things like skating backwards for a few steps or connecting a nice pass.

Gillian knows herself, and under the fluorescents of the rink in the middle of the day, disconnected from the Leafs and what she’s supposed to play for, she can admit to herself that she’s lost herself in this, whatever it is. She has a crush. A real crush, the kind that makes her want to ask Meghan out for drinks. Even if Meghan wanted to sleep with her again--which is questionable at best, at this point, considering she hasn’t said anything to that tune in months--Gillian would be hesitant, because she knows she’d want Meghan to stay. And that just isn’t realistic.

They play each other in the prelims, and by some cruel twist of fate Gillian ends up next to Meghan on more than one faceoff. The first time, Meghan shuffles next to her, close enough that their hips bump. Anyone else would assume Meghan’s being a pest. A year ago, Gillian would have assumed Meghan was just trying to rile her up, but now she can’t stop trying to read into it. She’s playing fine, but the second time they’re together for a faceoff, halfway through the third, Meghan uses the butt of her stick to tap Gillian’s thigh. Gillian gets actual, honest to god butterflies from Meghan’s attention. She swats Meghan’s stick away from her and the ref gives her a warning glance. She knows it’s the only one she’s going to get.

They’re losing. More Americans are in the NHL--the opposite of the situation with men--and it shows. The game is evolving. The US is playing...bigger.

“Don’t be a sore loser,” Meghan says around her mouthguard, and Gillian doesn’t even have to try to answer because the puck drops and she tells herself she has better things to think about.

It’s the last time they’re on the ice together until the handshake line. Gillian is supposed to be setting an example for the rookies, but she wants nothing more than to be surly. It’s just a prelim, but it feels bad. It feels worse when Meghan grabs her wrist instead of her hand, pulling her closer a little bit by the forearm when she says ‘good game.’ She’s saying something else, too, but Gillian’ isn’t sure what it is, and she thinks that was probably the point. Meghan is making it so that Gillian will have to text her to figure out what’s going on.

And Gillian plays right into it.

‘If you’re trying to bait me into fighting you,’ she texts, ‘it’s not gonna happen in a canada jersey.’

‘Leafs jersey, Canada jersey, same thing,’ Meghan responds within a minute, which tells Gillian two things: one, she was waiting for the text. Two, she’s not disputing the idea that she was trying to goad Gillian into a fight.

‘Up for a bet?’ Meghan texts her, without waiting for a response to her chirp.

‘depends what it is,’ Gillian responds. She waits a full seven minutes to do it, washing her face and brushing her teeth and being very careful to avoid Mikk’s gaze, because if anyone’s going to see right through her without having to try...she doesn’t need the headache.

‘gold medal game winner gets to do whatever they want to the loser,’ Meghan replies.

Gillian needs another five minutes to process that.

They haven’t seen each other in months. The last time they did, Meghan hinted that she wasn’t _only_ sleeping with Gillian. Gillian knows she has a crush on Meghan, a real one, and she knows how stupid it is to keep sleeping with someone who doesn’t feel the same way, someone who has no issue finding other people to sleep with. She should turn her phone off and go to sleep.

‘you’d have to make it to the gold medal game to win that bet,’ she responds.

‘Is that a yes?’ 

Gillian turns off her phone. It’s not as good as saying no, but it’s better than what she could have done. It’s better than asking Meghan to meet her tonight. 

-

They win gold. It’s not quite as close as Meghan expected, but it still feels good, enough so that she forgets about Gillian entirely for a while. When she remembers, with her second beer in her hand and Team Canada streaming into the bar as if there’s only one in the whole city, Meghan’s stomach flips.

It wasn’t clear if Gillian took her bet, but if she did--

Meghan really should start planning out what she wants to do.

“Dance with us,” Monique insists, grabbing her by the hand, and Meghan only glances over her shoulder once, catching a glimpse of Gillian just before she forces herself to forget again, for a while. The next time she has a chance to breathe it’s water in her hand, or what’s left of a plastic bottled water that Kacey handed her. Kacey is nowhere to be seen, which either means she’s gone back with a girl or she’s gone back to their room alone to read a book and go to sleep before midnight.

Gillian shouldn’t be so hard to find. She’s taller than almost any of the other women there, and Meghan can’t believe she’s lost Gillian so easily. She panics for a moment, wondering if Gillian has gone home with someone else, but she’s just started reassuring herself that Gillian isn’t the type to play the field when she finally finds her.

Gillian is playing the field. She is very much playing the field. There’s a smaller woman in front of her, someone vaguely familiar to Meghan, with her back to Gillian’s front. She’s completely shameless, tossing her glossy, chestnut hair over her shoulder and grinding back against Gillian’s hips, and Gillian is letting her. Actually, ‘letting her’ doesn’t quite cover it. Gillian is into it. They look like any other pair on the dance floor, except that they make Meghan’s blood boil. 

Meghan watches for only a few more seconds before she drains the rest of Kacey’s water bottle, shoves it into the nearest trash can, and intervenes. She has no plan, so the best she can do is grab Gillian by the arm and say something about needing a second. Gillian is big enough that she doesn’t _have_ to follow Meghan, who’s not pulling her very hard, but she does. Meghan pulls her into a corner of the room that’s emptier and darker, and before she can let herself get hurt by the expression on Gillian’s face, she reaches up and drags Gillian down to kiss her. Right there in the bar, or club, or wherever they are.

“I was busy,” Gillian says, but she kissed Meghan back, so it’s obvious she didn’t mean it.

“Ask me if I care,” Meghan replies, digging her nails into the back of Gillian’s neck until Gillian’s hands go to her hips, like she’s debating pushing Meghan away. She makes her decision and pulls Meghan against her, and Meghan kisses her again. It’s a long, filthy kiss, and Meghan is dimly aware that other people can see them, people that both of them know, but she doesn’t care nearly enough not to do it.

“We won,” Meghan says, gripping Gillian’s shoulders, “that means you’re mine for the night.”

Gillian doesn’t argue with that, but she doesn’t say anything in the affirmative, either. On the contrary, her grip on Meghan loosens, and she glances over Meghan’s shoulder.

“You’re mine,” Meghan repeats, and Gillian makes eye contact with her again, finally.

“Then we’re going to yours,” she says.

-

Gillian has to resist the urge to tell Meghan she wasn’t going to sleep with Florence. The fact is that Gillian would have, because Florence is cute and into her and not Meghan, who is terrifying. Being alone with Meghan is terrifying. Being aware of the hold that Meghan has over her is terrifying.

They’re almost at Meghan’s hotel room when Gillian gets a text. She fumbles with her phone while Meghan fishes her room key out of her pocket, and she can feel herself turning bright pink when she reads what’s waiting for her.

‘totally saw all that,’ Spoons has texted her. 

“You texting that girl?” Meghan asks.

“No,” Gillian says, but she’s defensive enough about it that she knows it sounds suspicious. She shouldn’t care--it’s not like Meghan is her girlfriend--but she keeps remembering the timbre of Meghan’s voice when she had said, ‘you’re mine.’

Gillian wants to be.

She doesn’t try to convince Meghan that the text wasn’t what she thinks, and Meghan lets her in. She takes the phone out of Gillian’s hand, placing it on the dresser, and Gillian follows her, almost annoyed. Before she can reach for it Meghan is reaching for her, both hands on Gillian’s face when she drags her down into another kiss, this one just as searing and filthy as it had been at the club. Meghan’s tongue is already in her mouth and Gillian is already breathless, struggling to retain any semblance of control over herself, much less over Meghan.

Realistically she has control over nothing and Meghan already knows it.

“You’re wearing too many clothes,” Meghan says. Gillian ignores her, leaning in for Meghan’s lips again, but Meghan holds her back with a hand on Gillian’s chest. 

“Take them off,” Meghan says. Gillian is about to talk back, about to tell Meghan to take them off herself, but the look on Meghan’s face stops her. Meghan has lost the edge she had in the club. She’s softened, and she’s not making eye contact, but the way that she’s looking at Gillian, the way her thumb brushes over Gillian’s collarbone just above where her sweater ends--none of that is how GIllian remembers it. 

Whether she’s making that up so that she can pretend that Meghan feels more for her than what’s in her pants doesn’t matter as long as Meghan’s looking at her like _that_.

That’s how GIllian ends up undressing for Meghan, who slips out of her shirt and her shoes but nothing else. Nobody has ever looked at Gillian like this before, not even Meghan. It’s far beyond what she’s used to, far beyond the look a girl gives her when she wants to be touched. It might, actually, be the opposite, because Gillian can recognize it. She knows she’s looked at Meghan like this before. 

“I wasn’t going to sleep with her,” Gillian lies, because she needs Meghan to keep looking at her like that for as long as possible. 

“It doesn’t matter,” Meghan says, “I don’t want—don’t lie to me. It doesn’t matter.”

Gillian can’t understand why Meghan hasn’t tried to touch her yet, so she takes matters into her own hands, stepping close enough that she barely has to move her head for Meghan’s lips to find hers. It matters. She can taste how much it matters in the way Meghan kisses her, intensely and with purpose. She pushes until Gillian reclines on the nearer of the two beds (and prays that it’s Meghan’s). 

“Roll over,” Meghan breathes, and Gillian does it without thinking about it. On her stomach she feels absolutely ridiculous, her face burning, but then Meghan joins her on the bed, kneeling behind her, and the barest brush of Meghan’s fingertips over Gillian’s hips is enough for her to forget being embarrassed at all. She’s too busy trying to stop herself from moving back against Meghan.

She’s been in Meghan’s position before, but she’s never been here like this, sprawled out on her stomach waiting for the other girl to make a move. She’s surprised by how hot she is for it, how desperate she is already. Meghan palms her hips and Gillian takes a deep breath. That breath comes out in a rush when Meghan pulls Gillian back against her hips. Gillian has the sudden thought that Meghan is probably great with a strap-on, and the thought alone makes her head spin. She’s never _wanted_ that.

When Meghan puts some space between them again, Gillian barely gets any breath in her lungs before Meghan’s pressing her knees apart. Gillian loses control of herself the second that meghan’s hand slides between her legs. She’s past embarrassment, past trying to save face, unconcerned about inflating Meghan’s ego. She just wants to get off, and Meghan’s hands are so strong and sure and Meghan knows _exactly_ what she’s doing and Gillian can’t get enough of it. She barely registers rocking back against Meghan’s fingers until the breath seizes in her lungs and she freezes, pressing her face into the mattress. Meghan’s free hand is on her upper back, between her shoulderblades, and Gillian doesn’t remember that happening. When she gasps for breath she feels the pressure of Meghan’s palm against her skin and squirms.

She tries to lift herself up on her elbows, but Meghan holds her down, pressing weight into that hand between Gillian’s shoulders, and Gillian hears herself moan as if it’s coming from miles away. Meghan crooks her fingers and Gillian turns her face into the mattress so that it can muffle whatever sound she makes when she comes. It’s not quiet--she’s never been loud like this before, but she’s never come like this before, completely and utterly at someone else’s mercy, and it’s a lot for her--and the bed doesn’t really do much to hide anything from Meghan. Gillian imagines the satisfied smirk that must be on Meghan’s face and shudders again, clawing at the bedspread.

Meghan doesn’t take her hand away until Gillian moves away from it. When she does, Gillian rolls over into her back, taking a shaky breath. Meghan knee-walks until she’s straddling Gillian’s hips, pressing sticky fingertips into Gillian’s ribs, and Gillian doesn’t catch her breath before she pops the button on Meghan’s jeans and pushes her hand down the front of them.

Meghan’s eyelashes flutter and her composure falls just a little. Gillian wonders what she’s like when she’s with someone, really with someone, what the soft parts of her are that she doesn’t like to show. For the first time ever Gillian can see that they’re there, under the surface, and she wants to see Meghan like that, raw. She wants Meghan to want her to see. 

“I want to take you out,” Gillian says, somehow finding an angle to thrust her fingers beneath Meghan’s underwear. Meghan laughs, placing a hand on Gillian’s stomach, rolling her hips into Gillian’s touch. 

“I’m serious,” Gillian says, using her free hand to palm Meghan’s breast over her bra, “I want to take you on a date.”

“That’s a terrible idea,” Meghan says, rocking against the pressure of Gillian’s hand. Gillian yanks her hand out of Meghan’s pants, and Meghan grabs her wrist. Before Gillian can get rightfully annoyed, Meghan smiles crookedly at her. 

“I like it,” she says. “Let’s do it.”

-

The playoffs come fast after that. 

Gillian takes her out during a bye week, shows up in Boston with a plan all laid out. Over text all Meghan could tell was that Gillian was coming, but she knocks on Meghan’s door in a puffy coat with her nose pink from the cold and an itinerary. Meghan is hit with such a wave of fondness all of a sudden that it almost knocks her off her feet. 

It’s like they’re strangers again for the first five minutes of the train ride, before Gillian breaks the ice. 

“Are they sending you down for playoffs?” she asks, and the subject of hockey really shouldn’t be such a relief, all things considered, but it is. 

“No,” Meghan says, “not yet, anyway. They sent Kacey back down again. P-Bruins are making their own playoff push, so she’s still sort of, you know.”

“Yeah,” Gillian agrees. 

“They’re keeping you,” Meghan guesses, and Gillian shrugs. 

“I’m not a big scorer,” she says, “but i’m scoring the most on the fourth line, which says more about my line mates than it does about me.”

Meghan agrees that they’re a couple of bums, but she doesn’t agree that Gillian isn’t impressive enough to be there regardless. She doesn’t say so. The train slips underground, finally, and in the new light Meghan reaches for Gillian’s hand. It feels, for a second, as alien as the fluorescents make the whole thing look. Gillian looks at their hands, then looks up and smiles at Meghan like she can’t believe it. Meghan grins right back. 

“You might have been here already,” Gillian says, when they get off the train in the North End, “but I thought--I didn’t want it to be too …” she trails off, blushing, shoving her hands into her peacoat pockets, and Meghan wants to reach for her again but she doesn’t. 

“Too?” she prompts, and Gillian glances up at a tiny restaurant across the street.

“Romantic,” Gillian mumbles.

It’s exactly the right amount of romantic.

There aren’t any candles on the tables, but it’s a quiet, intimate little place, and the wine that Gillian orders after asking Meghan if she has a preference is perfect. All in all it’s one of the best first dates Meghan’s been on, and the longer they sit together the easier it is to believe that this is the same person she’s known for years only as someone who wants her to lose.

Eventually they have to bring it up. There’s only so much first-date discussion that can go on before they acknowledge that this is something a little bit different. She waits until dessert, and she keeps an eye on Gillian’s reaction while she picks at their shared cheesecake slice.

“So how are we doing this?” Meghan asks. It’s stupidly vague, but Gillian knows what she means. She shrugs.

“I don’t have a plan for everything,” she says, “just tonight. I just thought--it’s worth trying to do.”

“You might have to get traded,” Meghan warns her, and Gillian laughs, shaking her head.

“Seriously,” Gillian says, “I was trying not to think too hard about the logistics. I figured as long as you were willing to try it, we’d find a way to do it.”

Hearing Gillian talk about them as a unit makes Meghan’s stomach do something she’s never felt it do before. She thinks it might be butterflies, but whatever it is, it makes her kick Gillian’s ankle gently under the table. Gillian makes eye contact, finally, pink around her cheekbones.

“If it’s not something you want,” Gillian starts, and Meghan interrupts her desperately.

“It is,” she says, “it so is, I just--I’m still trying to wrap my mind around that part.”

Gillian nods. She doesn’t look satisfied, so Meghan reaches out again, this time for Gillian’s knee, under the table.

“I want to know you,” she says, “as a person, not an opponent or just someone I have sex with. Very, very good sex with.”

Gillian blushes violently, but she’s still not saying anything, and Meghan knows it’s coming down to her, coming down to Gillian being so open and her being terrified to do the same. The idea, though, that this date might end and Gillian might withdraw, that Meghan could miss out on something--even something terrifying in its possibilities--makes her serious, even with her heart pounding in her ears.

“I have a feeling I’d like you a lot more than I could have expected,” she says, and watches the way the tension leaves Gillian’s shoulders. Gillian covers Meghan’s hand on her own knee, just for a second. Meghan has the fleeting thought that she wants to comfort Gillian like this over and over and over again, as many times as she needs it.

Gillian kisses her at her doorstep.

“You should come up with me,” Meghan murmurs against Gillian’s mouth, holding onto her upper arms to keep them close. Gillian’s hands rest hesitantly on Meghan’s hips.

“I’m trying to be respectful,” Gillian says.

“We can’t do this very often during the season,” Meghan says, “we should take advantage of the time we have.”

She kisses Gillian again, this time slower, and Gillian holds her a little closer. Meghan knows before she pulls away that Gillian will follow her up.

-

“That’s not a word,” Meghan says for the fourth time. Her eyes are a little glassy from their second bottle of wine, and she’s leaning forward on the couch so far that Gillian’s worried about her falling onto the coffee table, where she’s just played “quetzals.”

“It is a word,” Gillian tells her, trying to keep from bursting into laughter. Meghan’s very serious, indignant, but Gillian can barely stop herself from losing it. “It’s the national bird of Guatemala.”

“Bullshit,” Meghan says, “you could tell me it’s anything and I’d believe you, why should I believe you?”

“Then look it up,” Gillian says, leaning back in her armchair.

“No,” Meghan says, “we agreed before the game we were only playing words we knew, not words we had to look up.”

“This is a word I know,” Gillian says.

“You’re a dirty liar,” Meghan announces, “and I wish there was a ref to tell you so.”

Gillian laughs, finally, the sound bubbling up out of her, completely out of her control. She’s not sure she’s ever laughed like that, without trying to, without meaning to. She must have, but she can’t remember it, can’t remember anything other than this moment, with Meghan. Nothing else feels real.

“Nice chirp,” Gillian says.

“Shut up,” Meghan replies, unfolding her legs from the couch so that she can stride around the coffee table. Gillian doesn’t have much time to prepare herself before Meghan is settling into her lap.

“I can’t decide whether you like me or not,” Gillian says, honestly.

Meghan is very focused and quiet all of a sudden, with her eyes on Gillian’s lips. She brushes her thumb across Gillian’s jaw, and her silence makes Gillian even more nervous, too nervous to do anything with her hands but place them inoffensively on the arms of the chair.

“I’ve never liked anyone like this,” Meghan murmurs, so quietly that Gillian can almost believe she imagined it.

Gillian wraps her arms around Meghan’s waist and Meghan leans down to kiss her. When they come up for air, Meghan swipes her lip gloss off of Gillian’s lower lip, and Gillian’s mind wanders. 

“Stay,” Meghan says, proving that Gillian’s not alone. 

“We’re drunk,” Gillian says, “I can’t—not while we’re both—I want to be with you, but sober.”

“Not,” Meghan starts, then sighs, pressing their foreheads together, “as much as I want to christen this armchair, I just meant...stay. That’s all I meant.”

So Gillian stays.


End file.
